Get it right AND get it first — journalism juggling in 2010.

Folks looking for an idea of whether the people who report the news in Akron think they’re doing a fair job of covering political issues might have been disappointed with the discussion at the Akron Press Club this afternoon. But the fact that the speakers didn’t stay on topic provided the audience with a rare opportunity to see how Summit County’s major media and political big shots view their own job security.

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So here’s a very simple question. I just jumped away for a few moments to find the correct spelling of the panelists names. So, does that make me an anal retentive reporter from dinosaur (print) media?

At any rate, here’s the panelists:

Dr. Stephen C. Brooks, Associate Professor of Political Science, University of Akron.

Ed Esposito, News Director, WAKR,

Doug Oplinger, Managing Editor, Akron Beacon Journal

M.L. Schultze (Moderator) News Director, WKSU

Mark Williamson, Director of Communication, City of Akron

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A panel of experts gathered together at the Akron Press Club luncheon today to mull over the weirdness that is modern media production. The discussion was supposed to be an evaluation of whether political reporting is fair, but that talk quickly evolved into what needs to be done to keep people interested in newspapers, and how you make immediate news posted to the web correct.

People now want to see the sausage made — 24 hours a day — so are journalists forgiven when we get things wrong to get it to you first?

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I’m at the Akron Press Club where local media leaders are discussing truth and fairness in political reporting. Stay tuned. I’ll be posting video and my take on what happened.